BOSTON — A bid by Lawrence to become the first city in the state to require voters to show a photo ID when they go to the polls was effectively killed in the Legislature yesterday.
The Election Laws Committee voted to have the proposal studied further, and bills sent to be studied are almost never put to a vote. The bill, first passed by the Lawrence City Council in February, would have required voters to show a driver's license, state issued identification card with a photo or valid passport.
Lawrence would have been the only community requiring voters to show a photo ID. That, said Rep. Garrett Bradley, D-Hingham and co-chairman of the committee, was a major problem. Lawmakers, he said, didn't want to set a precedent of allowing individual communities to have different election laws.
"We can't do it just for Lawrence," Bradley said.
Lawrence Mayor Michael Sullivan called the decision to reject a proposal approved by Lawrence officials "surprising and unfortunate."
"I wonder how that could happen when you have a home rule petition signed off by the City Council and the mayor," Sullivan said.
Sullivan said the bill was well thought out and would silence frequent rumors of electoral fraud and voter mischief.
But squelching rumors is not enough to make Lawrence an exception to state law, said Sen. Edward Augustus, a Worcester Democrat and co-chairman of the committee.
"It seems to be asking a lot to change the laws and inconvenience good voters to put to rest rumors," Augustus said.
And proponents never showed that voter fraud in Lawrence is real. Sullivan, in an interview, said he was not aware of actual voter fraud.
"What problem are we solving?" Augustus asked. "If the secretary of state or attorney general said there were complaints, lots of credible evidence, then a lot of us would be forced to look at it."
The city also never laid out in the bill how the ID system would work and who would pay for it, Augustus and Bradley said. A recent U.S. Supreme Court case said photo IDs were acceptable if the state paid for them. Augustus said Lawrence, and not the state, needed to pay for the IDs.
Moreover, Bradley and Augustus said the city never said how it would deal with the problem of confirming the identity of people voting by absentee ballot.
Sullivan said he thought there would be more "give and take" between the committee and the bill's proponents before action was taken. The committee assigned the bill a May 28 deadline for action.
Sullivan, who said he was unable to attend last Wednesday's public hearing because of budget meetings with city officials, said he could have answered Augustus and Bradley's questions. For instance, he said there'd be no cost to the state because Lawrence already has photographic equipment.
Although 25 states have voter ID laws, the bill was opposed by MassVote and the ACLU of Massachusetts, which contended requiring a photo ID was an unreasonable burden on voter access. It also had a powerful enemy in Secretary of State William Galvin, the state's chief election officer.
"He maintains election laws should be statewide and not a local option," said spokesman Brian McNiff. "There should not be separate rules for separate places."
Right now, voters can be asked to show a photo ID or current utility bill if they're a new voter who registers by mail or has been inactive. The checks have to be consistent and based on a reasonable suspicion.
Voter ID proponents said they'll be back.
"A majority of people want to see some kind of voter ID," said Marie Gosselin, a former Lawrence city councilor and bill proponent.
Although she doesn't expect to continue pushing the issue herself, Gosselin thinks lawmakers will eventually recognize the need for a beefed up voter ID law.
"I'm sure it's going to happen," Gosselin said.
